Update [2004-12-7 20:16:25 by galiel]: deafmetal's disturbing diary
Killing Witnesses ramps up the outrage.
The US military is drawing up plans to keep insurgents from regaining control of this battle-scarred city, but returning residents may find that the measures make Fallujah look more like a police state than the democracy they have been promised.
Under the plans, troops would funnel Fallujans to so-called citizen processing centers on the outskirts of the city to compile a database of their identities through DNA testing and retina scans. Residents would receive badges displaying their home addresses that they must wear at all times. Buses would ferry them into the city, where cars, the deadliest tool of suicide bombers, would be banned.
One idea that has stirred debate among Marine officers would require all men to work, for pay, in military-style battalions. Depending on their skills, they would be assigned jobs in construction, waterworks, or rubble-clearing platoons.
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http://www.boston.com/news/world/articles/2004/12/05/returning_fallujans_will_face_clampdown/
It gets "better" below the fold...
(Extended (but fair use) excerpts because of the stupid policy that says that new hot news is free, but you have to pay to see it again once it becomes old archived news, so the Boston Globe link I provided will not work for long and this is too important)
"You have to say, 'Here are the rules,' and you are firm and fair. That radiates stability," said Lieutenant Colonel Dave Bellon, intelligence officer for the First Regimental Combat Team, the Marine regiment that took the western half of Fallujah during the US assault and expects to be based downtown for some time.
Bellon asserted that previous attempts to win trust from Iraqis suspicious of US intentions had telegraphed weakness by asking, " 'What are your needs? What are your emotional needs?' All this Oprah [stuff]," he said. "They want to figure out who the dominant tribe is and say, 'I'm with you.' We need to be the benevolent, dominant tribe.
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Most Fallujans have not heard about the US plans. But for some people in a city that has long opposed the occupation, any presence of the Americans, and the restrictions they bring, feels threatening.
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"When the insurgents were here, we felt safe," said Ammar Ahmed, 19, a biology student at Anbar University. "At least I could move freely in the city; now I cannot."
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US commanders and Iraqi leaders have declared their intention to make Fallujah a "model city," where they can maintain the security that has eluded them elsewhere.
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To accomplish those goals, they think they will have to use coercive measures allowed under martial law imposed last month by Prime Minister Iyad Allawi.
"It's the Iraqi interim government that's coming up with all these ideas," Major General Richard Natonski, who commanded the Fallujah assault and oversees its reconstruction, said of the plans for identity badges and work brigades.
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Meanwhile, the large-scale return of residents to a city where only Humvees and dogs travel freely will make military operations as well as reconstruction a lot harder. The military must start letting people in, one neighborhood at a time, within weeks if Fallujans are to register for national elections before the end of January. The government insists the elections will proceed as scheduled despite widespread violence.
Yup, gotta make sure all those retina-scanned, badge-carrying citizens assigned to work in "military-style battalions" under the watchful eye of "haj" loving Marines can cast their free democratic vote, no pressure...
Hey, if nothing else, it's a good trial-run for a nifty new solution to the election problems here in the US, no?
Tensions rose when about a dozen women and children started climbing into ambulances for the ride to Baghdad.
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Suhad Molah, a young woman in a veil that showed only her eyes, was indignant that a translator said she might be Syrian because of her accent, implying she was the wife of a foreign fighter.
"I am Iraqi," she said, adding that she and her children had been trapped in their house for weeks.
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When they heard of the proposal to require men to work, some Marines were skeptical that an angry public would work effectively if coerced. Others said the plan was based on US tactics that worked in postwar Germany.
Kinda makes you proud to be an American, don't it?